The Princess in the Tower: Zelda Fitzgerald's Creative Impasse

Abstract

Gifted women often find it difficult to integrate an acceptable social image with an autonomous artistic identity. This paper explores the ambitions and conflicts of Zelda Fitzgerald, who aspired to be an artist in several fields, but whose fame is largely contingent on the role she played in the life of her husband, F. Scott Fitzgerald. Zelda's flamboyant public pose, which served as a model for many of her husband's literary characters, is interpreted as an attempt to organize a consistent identity configuration by means of constant appeals for applause from an admiring audience. But although this configuration provided some stability and cohesion for her during her twenties, it was a superficial and vulnerable structure which failed to support her serious artistic aspirations. An examination of the separation conflicts and difficulties in internalization which contributed to Zelda's dilemma leads to a consideration of the role of the father in the organization of differentiated female achievements. Although Zelda Fitzgerald's pathology was extreme, her struggles suggest useful insights into the intrapsychic and social barriers commonly confronting creative women.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abelin, E. L. (1971). The role of the father in the separation-individuation process. In Separation-individuation: Essays in Honor of Margaret S. Mahler, ed. J. McDevitt & C. Settlage . New York: Int. Univ. Press, pp. 229–252.

Allen, F. L. (1931). Only Yesterday. New York: Harper.

Bak, R. C. (1968). The phallic woman: The ubiquitous fantasy in perversions. Psychoanal. Study Child, 23:15–36.

Bruccoli, M. J. , Ed. (1978). The Notebooks of F. Scott Fitzgerald. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

Bruccoli, M. J. , Ed. (1981). Some Sort of Epic Grandeur: The Life of F. Scott Fitzgerald. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

Bruccoli, M. J. , & Duggan, M. , Eds. (1980). Correspondence of F. Scott Fitzgerald. New York: Random House.

Bruccoli, M. J. , Smith, S. F. & Kerr, J. P. , Eds. (1974). The Romantic Egoists. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

Cowley, M. , Ed. (1951). The Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

Fitzgerald, F. S. (1920). This Side of Paradise. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

10.

Fitzgerald, F. S. (1922). The Beautiful and Damned. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

11.

Fitzgerald, F. S. (1925). The Great Gatsby. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

12.

Fitzgerald, F. S. (1934). Tender Is the Night. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

13.

Fitzgerald, F. S. & Fitzgerald, Z. (1973). Bits of Paradise: 21 Uncollected Stories. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

14.

Fitzgerald, Z. (1922). Eulogy on the flapper. In Bruccoli et al. (1974), p. 78.

15.

Fitzgerald, Z. (Sayre) (n.d.). Mrs. F. Scott Fitzgerald reviews The Beautiful and Damned. In Bruccoli et al. (1974), p. 100.

16.

Fitzgerald, Z. (1925). What became of our flappers and sheiks? In Bruccoli et al. (1974), p. 133.

17.

Fitzgerald, Z. (1932). Save Me the Waltz. Carbondale: Southern Illinois Univ. Press, 1967.

18.

Freud, S. (1927). Fetishism. S. E., 21.

19.

Gediman, H. (1981). On love, dying together, and Liebestod fantasies. J. Amer. Psychoanal. Assn., 29:607–630.

20.

Greenacre, P. (1958). The relation of the imposter to the artist. In Emotional Growth, Vol. 2. New York: Int. Univ. Press, 1971, pp. 533–554.

21.

Greenacre, P. (1960). Woman as artist. In Emotional Growth, Vol. 2. New York: Int. Univ. Press, 1971, pp. 575–591.

22.

Greenson, R. (1958). On screen defenses, screen hunger and screen identity. J. Amer. Psychoanal. Assn., 6:242–262.

23.

Hemingway, E. (1964). A Moveable Feast. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

24.

Kohut, H. (1971). The Analysis of the Self. New York: Int. Univ. Press.

25.

Kris, E. (1936). Comments on spontaneous artistic creations by psychotics. In Psychoanalytic Explorations in Art. New York: Int. Univ. Press, 1952, pp. 87–127.

26.

Mayfield, S. (1971). Exiles from Paradise: Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald. New York: Delacorte Press.

27.

Milford, N. (1970). Zelda. New York: Harper & Row.

28.

Mizener, A. (1951). The Far Side of Paradise. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

29.

Moore, H. (1967). Preface to Save Me the Waltz. Carbondale: Southern Illinois Univ. Press.

30.

Owen, M. (1911). Children of the Alabama judiciary. In Bruccoli et al. (1974), p. 40.

31.

Parens, H. (1980). An exploration of the relations of instinctual drives and the symbiosis/separation-individuation process. J. Amer. Psychoanal. Assn., 28:89–114.

32.

Smith, F. (1921). Flappers and fame: an interview with F. Scott Fitzgerald. In Bruccoli et al. (1974), p. 79.

33.

Tomkins, C. (1962). Living Well Is the Best Revenge. New York: Viking Press.

34.

Waites, E. (1982). Fixing women: devaluation, idealization, and the female fetish. J. Amer. Psychoanal. Assn., 30:435–459.

35.

Wilson, E. (1975). The Twenties. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

36.

Winnicott, D. (1971). Playing and Reality. New York: Basic Books.